wed  27 March 2013           mid afternoon  16:00  -  17:00

                          The Paddocks & Barleyfield           

Still searching for the elusive migrants. A quick walk round produced nothing of note,perhaps its a blessing the chiffchaffs and blackcaps have not made it yet. A post on the devon bird forum ( where there's no snow ) shows there struggling to to find insects even in the slightly better conditions down there.

River Exe and Canal at Countess Weir

 A qiuck walk along the toepath towards the DWT Sludge Beds reserve lunch time produced large numbers of Chiffchaffs right along the banks of both river and canal searching for insects. A couple of Sand Martins struggling to find any fly life along the canal. The one in the photo landed on a branch quite close to me it looked very weak, cold, wet, and hungry. Earlier an Angler had netted out a Sandmartin which had landed in the canal. The bird later died. Needs to warm up soon!! Insect feeders are struggling.